Voters To Determine Fate Of Tax Plan For Rescue Unit

CASSELBERRY — Although the city plans to propose an increase in the special tax for the paramedic unit, residents could nip the program completely this fall by voting to end the tax.

City council members agreed during a work session this week to recommend that the current .75 mills be raised to 1.28 mills so the department can buy a new rescue van and hire three paramedic/firefighters .

That means instead of paying 75 cents for each $1,000 of taxable property value residents would be paying $1.28. The new millage would bring in about $485,000, the bulk of the project's cost.

Residents vote every two years whether to keep the tax and, if so, whether to raise it. The referendum will be held in November although the increase would not take effect until the 1988-89 budget year.

Council chairman Carl Robertson, who said he is a heart patient and very much favors the advanced life support program, said voters first must decide whether to keep the program.

''If they don't support it, it won't fly,'' he said.

Mayor Owen Sheppard said the city would be faced with a problem if residents decided to end the program. Equipment would have to be sold and paramedics would lose their jobs, said.

''If they accept the paramedics program then they have to accept the costs,'' Sheppard said.

Gene Fry, emergency medical services commander, had requested a maximum increase to 1.35 mills so the department would have enough money left for an emergency. However, Robertson and council members Tom Embree and Richard Russo voted for the 1.28 millage while Frank Stone and Al Harmon voted to levy it at 1.32 mills.

The council is expected to give a final vote at the next meeting Monday.

Fry said the ALS unit could be run comfortably with a 1.32 millage because the program would have a contingency fund of about $10,000. He said financing the program would be tougher with the 1.28 millage and that such a levy would mean less of a contingency fund.

The city runs a rescue van from the Red Bug Lake Road fire station with two paramedics aboard, Fry said. At the Lake Triplet Drive station near city hall, one paramedic rides the engine, he said. A new van is estimated to cost $60,000.

Having two vans and a total of 12 paramedics would allow the department to run three shifts of a two-member rescue team from each station, Fry said.

In addition to increasing the millage, Fry also has asked the city to consider creating supervisory positions for senior paramedics, those who have an unspecified number of years experience, have been certified and who have passed a supervisor's test.

He said three such posts are needed to give Casselberry paramedics a chance to move up. Without an advancement incentive, paramedics often switch to becoming full-time firefighters to earn more money and higher ranks, he said.